Charles Sheeler : Paintings

“Photography is nature seen from the eyes outward, painting from the eyes inward” C Sheeler

Charles Sheeler
On Shaker Theme #2
Tempera on paper
1956

Charles Sheeler
Composition around White
Oil on canvas
1959

Charles Sheeler
Windows
Oil on canvas
1952

Charles Sheeler
Aerial Gyrations
Oil on canvas
1953

Charles Sheeler
Ore into Iron
Oil on canvas
1953

“My interest in photography, paralleling that in painting, has been based on admiration for its possibility of accounting for the visual world with an exactitude not equaled by any other medium. The difference in the manner of arrival at their destination–the painting being the result of a composite image and the photograph being the result of a single image; prevents these media from being competitive.” Charles Sheeler

The American modernist Charles Sheeler (1883–1965) explored the relationships between photography, film, and more traditional media such as painting and drawing with more rigor and intellectual discipline than perhaps any other artist of his generation. As in a well-conceived scientific experiment, Sheeler used his own photographs and film stills as the basis for paintings and drawings, thus crystallizing the differences and similarities between them. Works in one medium manage to function as independent objects while also being inextricably linked to works in other media.

During Sheeler’s lifetime the essential role that photography played in his creative process was often criticized or obscured because the medium’s legitimacy as an art form remained controversial. In 1931 Sheeler himself — wary of being accused of simply copying his photographs, and at the behest of his dealer, Edith Halpert — began downplaying their connections. Yet the complex dialogue Sheeler forged among various techniques early in the century is one of his most innovative and important contributions to the history of American modernism. [Extract : Introduction : Charles Sheeler : Across Media]

Charles Sheeler : Across Media : Exhibition Feature

American Modernism : The Shein Collection

Charles Sheeler & Photographic Myth

Jenny Okun : Photography

Bergamot White Triptych
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Inkjet Print
1997

Morphosis Beverly Building Triptych
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Inkjet Print
1988

Getty Shadows Triptych
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Inkjet Print
1997

Getty Terrace Triptych
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Inkjet Print
1997

Carmy House Floor Triptych
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.
Inkjet Print
1995

Okun records architectural structures through multiple exposures. Using a large-format Hasselblad camera, she takes a picture, then advances the film only slightly to achieve a layering effect. A single image may comprise six such overlays, which might then become part of a triptych. Okun’s background is in film, so it follows that the spatial information unfolds sequentially; the images are fragmented and superimposed, causing unexpectedly lyrical interpretations of buildings and space to emerge.

Yet for all their abstraction, what is also compelling about these images is their essentially traditional approach to the documentation of architecture. These days, architectural photography tends to consider circumstances beyond the built form:- climate, use, landscape, and human accessibility — to position the building in its social and environmental context. Okun, however, sticks to the structural facts; her images read as formal records and revelations of space, form, color, and light.

[Extract : Metropolis Magazine, May 1996 : Harmonious Fragments By Akiko Busch]

Craig Krull Gallery

Jenny Okun : Website

Kashya Hildebrand Gallery

Francis Bacon : Paintings (Triptych)

Second Version of Triptych 1944
oil on canvas
198.1 x 147.3 cm (each)
1988

Second Version of Triptych 1944
oil on canvas
198.1 x 147.3 cm
1988

Second Version of Triptych 1944
oil on canvas
198.1 x 147.3 cm
1988

Second Version of Triptych 1944
oil on canvas
198.1 x 147.3 cm
1988

Francis Bacon is internationally acknowledged as among the most powerful painters of the twentieth century. His vision of the world was unflinching and entirely individual, encompassing images of sensuality and brutality, both immediate and timeless. When he first emerged to public recognition, in the aftermath of the Second World War, his paintings were greeted with horror. Shock has since been joined by a wide appreciation of Bacon’s ability to expose humanity’s frailties and drives.

Bacon sought to express what it was to live in a world without God or afterlife. By setting sensual abandon and physical compulsion against hopelessness and irrationality, he showed the human as simply another animal. As a response to the challenge that photography posed for painting, he developed a unique realism which could convey more about the state of existence than photography’s representation of the perceived world. In an era dominated by abstract art, he amassed and drew upon a vast array of visual imagery, including art of the past, photography and film. [Tate Britain]

Francis Bacon : Estate

Explore Francis Bacon : Tate Britain

Caribou : Sun (Music Video)

Joan Miró : Etchings : Le Désespéranto (The Despairing One)

A series of eight etchings printed from a hand-shaped copperplate – 1949

After the liberation of France in 1944, Miro felt a new sense of hope. He visited America working with Stanley William Hayter in New York, after returning to Paris in 1947 he joined into a collaboration with the poet ‘Tristan Tzara’ who had collected three volumes of his writings from various periods under the general title ‘L’Antitête’ and illustrated the third part ‘Le Désespéranto’ (The Despairing One) with an astonishing set of etchings made from small shaped copper plates. The book was published in 1949 by Bordas in Paris in an edition of 200 exemplars, each of which was signed by author and the artists. The edition consisted of 8 copies on imperial japan paper. [Extract : Spaightwood Galleries]

Joan Miró Foundation : Barcelona

Robert Motherwell : Africa Suite (Screenprints)

Africa 2
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Africa 1
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Africa 3
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Africa 9
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Africa 4
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Africa 5
Screenprint on paper
810 x 597 mm
1970

Robert Motherwell was one of the leading Abstract Expressionist painters from the New York School. As an action painter he applied the concept of automatism (the automatic action allowing unconscious ideas and feelings to be expressed). Almost contrary to this free-associative way of composing was that for Robert Motherwell the next step in art making was more formal in that he often used these compositions as studies for his prints and paintings.

In 1970 Robert Motherwell made 11 drawings for the Africa Suite. These are bold ink on paper gestures with white acrylic overpainting and white paper masking done in Robert Motherwell’s iconic black and white palette. In order to determine the final size of the silkscreens Motherwell adhered the drawings onto a base sheet. The 10 resulting silkscreens that comprise the Africa Suite are large in format (40 3/4 x 28 1/4 inches). Printmaking was a major medium for Motherwell and this project represents the first time the artist worked with silkscreening. [Extract : Greenfield Sacks Gallery]

Robert Motherwell : The Dedalus Foundation